XC Run Day 24

I'm headed home. Oh, I have places yet to go, people yet to meet and sights yet to see, but; it was Saturday, I think, when I realized that I had gone as far East and South as I was going to go. Every mile I ride now is taking me North and West and, inexorably, home.

I am glad of it. I miss the West. Miss its vistas and grandeur. Miss its people, whom Loren C. Eiseley ("The Night Country: Reflections of a Bone Hunting Man") described as "...having horizons in their eyes.". I miss the Big Country. There are other things I miss, people and places, but they are personal. I hold those quietly and gently close to my breast.

Florida appeared in the rear-view mirrors today. So did Georgia. I've left a time zone behind. Headin' North and West. 27, 84 now 231, runnin', once again, on the edges of the storms. I keep wondering why the road is being so good to me. "A price will be paid." I keep thinking. I find myself already looking ahead to the Rockies in early September. Will it be extracted there? An early storm just as I'm cresting a pass? I'm not usually a pessimist, but I've been to this dance before, waltzed with Mother Nature. She has a sly, wicked sense of humor.

But today I was rollin' easy. Runnin' this red dirt country, hardly noticing what little there was to see. Little rollers now, slopes so slight and short you barely need touch the throttle to climb them. Runnin' through Dixie. Careful, right at the speed limit, not a mile over. Life in the right lane, big rigs barrelin' past, good 'ol boys in big Fords and Dodge Ram diesels comin' on up then whippin' out at the last minute to pass at what they considered as close as they dared. Good thing their idea of close and a Californian's is so different. On Highway 99 it would seem like tons of room.  Weren't that many of 'em, anyway.

I've started the process of contacting the Brothers North and East of here. Tryin' to put together a run for that long diagonal through Arkansas and up into the Ozarks. Surely would like to roll into Marble Falls about 20 strong, exhausts bellowin', announcing we're there. The Hub folks won't mind. The place we hold this thing bills itself as "America's Motorcycle Resort". They oughtta like it when ya' come in loud and strong like a Club should. We're Masons, our goal is not to terrorize the natives -- we just want to ride and visit with our Brothers and hang and get a little Club business done.

But 'scooter tramps do dearly love to make an entrance.

Talk to ya' tomorrow.